Crafting Creative Systems

How to Die Empty

This months book review is on Die Empty written by Todd Henry. I personally am an avid fan of his work and I listen to his podcast, Accidental Creative, every time it comes out, but that is a story for a different time.

Find your passion and make it a priority!

BLUF:This book is amazing and is a quick read, which is really good because you will want to read it more than once. Putting all the amazing actions into motion will take you a bit more time.

RESONATE: One of the key points of the book that resonated with me for the first time that I read it was the simplification of the three types of work that we do:

Meshing: activites that stretch and grow you

Making: actually doing the work

Mapping: Planning, plotting objectives, and setting priorities

The combination of the these three activities combines into four different personality types: driver, dreamer, developer, and drifter. I personally am a drifter!

5 Action Items to Implement from the book

Find Your Personal Tribe. Identify two people that you can meet with regularly and who can keep you on track.

Set goals that make your Uncomfortable. Set a daily goal, a two week goal, and one long arc goal that will force you to continually move forward.

Figure out why you Wander. Evaluate that you are doing something that you stand for and close all the open loops.

Cultivate a Service Mindset. Every action you take should be influenced by Generosity, Initiative, Forward Momentum and Transparency.

Seek opportunities to do better work.

In the spirit of full disclosure, this is an affiliate link, which means that I may get a commissions if you decide to purchase anything from Amazon company. I only recommend products & systems that I use and love myself, so I know you’ll be in good hands.